A pair of former Eagles playmakers faced off on Sunday when LeSean McCoy and the Bills battled Jeremy Maclin and the Chiefs in a fight for playoff picture relevancy. Maclin and Kansas City prevailed, 30-22, on the back of an impressive outing from the wideout.

Maclin caught nine passes for 160 yards and a touchdown, propelling the Chiefs’ offense, while McCoy had 101 total yards and a receiving TD.

“[Maclin] made the Bills pay for their decision to single-cover him early in the game,” ESPN’s Adam Teicher writes. “He caught a 37-yard pass to set up Kansas City’s first touchdown and scored their second one on a 41-yard catch. He finished with nine catches and a season-high 160 yards.”

Maclin now has 57 catches for 772 yards and three touchdowns this year. He has over 140 receiving yards more than the Eagles’ leading pass-catcher, Jordan Matthews, and has already eclipsed Kansas City’s leading receiver from last year, Dwayne Bowe.

Monday afternoon, the inevitable became the reality. Jeff Fisher benched Nick Foles as the Rams’ starting quarterback in favor of Case Keenum after nine underwhelming games from Foles, the quarterback they traded for this offseason and extended before the regular season began, writes ESPN’s Nick Wagoner.

“We’re going to go ahead and go with [Keenum],” Fisher told reporters Monday, per Wagoner. “This is my decision. Nobody came down the hall and said, ‘This is what we need to do.’ The lack of offensive production is a collective effort and coaching. But we need more production, and it starts with that position.

“I don’t expect Nick to like it,” Fisher continued to tell reporters. “He’s competitive, but he understands, and we’re gonna move forward here. I’m not saying this is week-to-week, but this is what’s best right now for our team as we move forward, from a production standpoint offensively.” Read more »

Jeremy Maclin suffered a concussion in the Chiefs’ loss to the Vikings in Week 6, leaving the game in the fourth quarter after hitting his head hard on the turf.

According to Blair Kerkhoff of the Kansas City Star, Chiefs trainer Rick Burkholder said that Maclin had passed the concussion test by Friday of Week 7, but the team held him out as a precautionary measure.

“There’s a lot of layers to this thing, and we felt as a group it was best to hold him,” Burkholder said, according to Kerkhoff. “That’s what we do as a medical staff in the National Football League. We’re charged with protecting these players and along with coach (Andy) Reid, Jeremy and our docs, we made a decision to hold him.” Read more »

After a sturdy first quarter of the season in St. Louis, Nick Foles came crashing back down to Earth when the Rams trekked to Lambeau Field to face Aaron Rodgers and the Packers.

Foles and the Rams only lost by two touchdowns, but Foles was hit and rushed all afternoon long, and he threw four interceptions, completing just 11 of his 3o pass attempts. He was also sacked thrice, and knocked down nine more times.

On this particular day, an assistant coach from Michigan dropped by the school to make a sales pitch to young Sam.

The coach knew that, in addition to being an all-state quarterback, Bradford also played on the basketball and golf teams at Putnam City North. Which presented him with an opportunity to drop Michigan alum Tom Brady’s name into the conversation for the 100th time.

“You know, son,” the coach said. “Tom is a big golfer. I think I probably could arrange for you to play a round with him. Would you like that? He’d give you a few strokes, of course.”

Bradford looked at the coach, smiled, and without the slightest hint of arrogance, replied, “I don’t need any strokes.”

Cary Williams wasn’t afraid to speak his mind when he was in Philadelphia.

And that’s continued now that he’s a member of the Seattle Seahawks.

During an interview with ESPN 710 in Seattle, Williams sounded off about Chip Kelly’s methods and what doomed the Eagles down the stretch last season. He was asked specifically about what was going through the players’ minds before their December matchup against the Seahawks.

“We were talking about the fact that our conditioning and things like that were going to kick in because we worked harder than everybody in the National Football League with the Chip Kelly thing,” Williams said. “When we got out there, we got our teeth kicked in, so all that conditioning didn’t necessarily work. The preparation wasn’t necessarily the greatest that week. So when you’re going up against teams that prepare, practice well, coach well, it’s difficult in games like that. And I think towards the end of the year, we were exhausted, and we got outcoached the majority of the games. Read more »

The Eagles will give restricted free agent Chris Polk a low tender, per NJ.com, which would put his salary at approximately $1.5 million for 2015. Teams that want to snatch a low tendered free agent away from their current employer must give up a draft pick equal to where that player was drafted. Polk, though, was an undrafted free agent, so no compensation in this case is required.

The Eagles could have ensured that he’d remain with the team by offering a higher tender, but that would have cost more money. This tells us that they are interested in having Polk back but at their price, and are probably willing to let him walk if another team comes in and sweetens the pot. They do have the right of first refusal should they want to match an incoming offer.Read more »

The Eagles announced Tuesday that they have released cornerback Cary Williams.

The move saves the team $6.5 million in cap space. Williams was scheduled to make $8.17M in 2015. There had been some thought that the Eagles would see what they could get in free agency before making a decision on Williams, but they decided to simply cut ties with him. Read more »